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K-State Today

April 16, 2019

Lecture: 'Timing of Violence over the Election Cycle'

Submitted by Department of Political Science

The political science department, part of K-State's College of Arts and Sciences, will host Richard W. Frank, lecturer at the School of Political and International Relations at Australian National University, for a lecture titled "The Timing of Violence over the Election Cycle." The lecture is scheduled for 10:30 a.m. Thursday, April 25, in 301 Calvin Hall.

Frank's presentation asks the question of why some elections precipitate violence while others do not. He explains how four election-cycle characteristics — campaign length, multiple election rounds, bans and boycotts — can precipitate violence and analyzes newly gathered electoral cycle data on these four election characteristics. These data include a random selection of 567 elections in 67 countries from 1991 to 2016. The empirical findings contribute to the literature's understanding of the temporal dynamics of electoral violence and provide more fine-grained policy implications for recognizing, and potentially reducing, the risk of violence over the electoral cycle.